Day 2

What a thrill to finish a book! I am the queen of starting several and plodding partway through them all….

Though I suppose I should give myself a little more credit than that. I DID read The Story of Edgar Sawtelle over the winter break. That was a book that left me staring at the ceiling wondering…wondering….wondering…. What was the motivation of the characters precisely? I get that there’s a strong thematic allusion to Hamlet…but beyond that? I was left with why why why…. While simultaneously marveling at the skill with which Wroblewski crafted his sentences.

But enough of that. The Stranger! Yes, what a book. It left me pondering what it means to live life with intention.

The writing took my breath away, especially here:
Then everything began to reel before my eyes, a fiery gust came from the sea, while the sky cracked in two, from end to end, and a great sheet of flame poured down through the rift. Every nerve in my body was a steel spring, and my grip closed on the revolver. The trigger gave, and the smooth underbelly of the butt jogged my palm. And so, with that crisp, whipcrack sound, it all began. I shook off my sweat and the clinging veil of light. I knew I’d shattered the balance of the day, the spacious calm of this beach on which I’d been happy. But I fired four more shots into the inert body, on which they left no visible trace. And each successive shot was another loud, fateful rap on the door of my undoing.

Wow.

Up next, an unassuming little book called The Facts About Shakespeare:

I read over the first page and so far so good…but had to laugh, cause I’m a bit of a dork like that, when I came to this line, written in context of the times in which Shakespeare lived (a time of great change….):The names that crowd the next fifty years represent fine native endowments, boundless aspiration, and also novelty–as Spenser in poetry, Bacon in philosophy, Hooker in theology.